Global Water Conference Eyes Projects

Published 7:00 pm, Sunday, March 16, 2003

The world's biggest international water conference began Sunday with international financiers and small-scale project leaders at odds over how to finance water projects for the poor.

Some 10,000 ministers, scientists and international financiers from 165 nations are debating how to halve the number of people without access to water by 2015.

The United Nations has said that the world's water crises can be solved if rich, developed nations devote about $100 billion more than the $80 billion a year currently spent on developing countries.

But in a panel discussion at the forum, Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute said an extra $10 billion a year _ spread out among a multitude of small projects in Africa, Latin America and Asia _ would suffice.

"The money is out there. But money for water areas is currently misspent," said Gleick, president of the Oakland, Calif.-based think tank.

He and other critics of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund say large-scale projects often end up threatening local ecosystems and overlooking poor rural subsistence farmers, who face the worst water shortages.

Water piped directly to homes would probably make the greatest improvement to people's lives, said Jamie Bartram, the World Health Organization's coordinator for water, sanitation and health.

Many in the poorest countries walk several miles for water for cleaning, cooking and drinking, but often can't carry the 13 gallons needed per person per day, he said.

"To get a certain level of health improvements, you need water to reach a plot of land," Bartram said.

The discussion on financing water projects for the poor was the first at the triennial conference, which is being held in three locations _ Kyoto, Osaka and Shiga in western Japan. They are expected to discuss how to meet targets water-access targets sat at the World Summit on Sustainable Development last September in Johannesburg, South Africa.

While some nations may secure bilateral aid deals on the sidelines of the conference, none of the delegates is expected to announce increased spending for water, organizers said.

The world's water crisis is huge. Contaminated pipelines, rivers and underground aquifers cause more than 200 million people every year to contract water-related diseases such as cholera and typhoid. Between 2 million and 5 million of them _ mostly the poor _ die.

Hydrologists say crop irrigation, which accounts for 70 percent of all water use, remains inefficient. Rising population and spreading industrialization are only aggravating the situation, they say.